1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to digital photography and, more particularly, to a system and method for hardcopy printing the time stamp information that accompanies the image of a corresponding digital photograph.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, when digital images are downloaded into a personal computer or specialized printer, an application must be used to open the image first, before a Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) or Tag Image File Format (TIFF) image file can be operated on. Then, a printer driver is used to convert the data into a printer-ready format. Some prior art printer drivers provide users with the ability to embed some additional information into the output image. For example, users can add watermarks or backgrounds to the printing data. Prior art printer drivers work well on most image files, however, some information of the image file generated by a digital camera is lost in the printing process. Specifically, when these prior art printer drivers process images generated by a digital camera, the date or time stamp information for the corresponding pictures is lost.
Industrial printers exist that provide a limited capability for editing an image at the printer. These specialized printers allow the user to add prepress operations including adding page numbers, header/footer text, or photos and/or halftones to an existing page of text. However, these printers do not allow the user to extract date information from an image file before a hard copy of the image is made. It is also known to digitally modify raster data or embed signatures within visual images in both digital representation and print or film. However, there is no process of printing the time stamp with an image using a conventional printer.
It would be advantageous if the time stamp information that accompanies the image information downloaded from a digital camera could be used.
It would be advantageous if a user could easily select the time stamp to be included on the printed image. Likewise, it would be advantageous if the presentation and placement of time stamp information on the image could be easily manipulated by a user.